Naasar ako :Angry:! Grabe! Nag-experiment kasi ako kanina sa lighting, sa exposure, sa use of lens, sa kasal na kinover ko kanina. Tininitingnan ko ngayon yung mga shots ko, wala akong makita na papasa sa aking (lalo na sa asawa kong) taste. Buti na lang at di ako ang main fotog. 4 gig of photos, wala akong makita!

I relied on my 70-200VR which I have just used once, and even then sandaling-sandali lang. Dami kong shots taken at 1/10th of a second to 1/30th, puro blurred... grrr!!! Okay naman sya sa lcd ng camera pagdating ko dito sa bahay, blurred! Mas mabuti pa noong ginamit ko lang yung 80-200/2.8 sa last wedding ko, at least conscious ako na I cannot go below a certain speed.

Andami pa akong kinakaasaran... buti na lang mabait yung couple.

Just venting... sorry... :(

Marco

Naasar ako :Angry:! Grabe! Nag-experiment kasi ako kanina sa lighting, sa exposure, sa use of lens, sa kasal na kinover ko kanina. Tininitingnan ko ngayon yung mga shots ko, wala akong makita na papasa sa aking (lalo na sa asawa kong) taste. Buti na lang at di ako ang main fotog. 4 gig of photos, wala akong makita!

I relied on my 70-200VR which I have just used once, and even then sandaling-sandali lang. Dami kong shots taken at 1/10th of a second to 1/30th, puro blurred... grrr!!! Okay naman sya sa lcd ng camera pagdating ko dito sa bahay, blurred! Mas mabuti pa noong ginamit ko lang yung 80-200/2.8 sa last wedding ko, at least conscious ako na I cannot go below a certain speed.

Andami pa akong kinakaasaran... buti na lang mabait yung couple.

Just venting... sorry... :(

Marco

Cool lang Marco! Breathe...

What are your VR settings sa 70-200?

And 1/10th to 1/30th of a second... serious?!? Chances are you were a victim of subject movement... mmmmmmm... more details please...

Cool lang Marco! Breathe...

What are your VR settings sa 70-200?

And 1/10th to 1/30th of a second... serious?!? Chances are you were a victim of subject movement... mmmmmmm... more details please...

Naka-set ang VR ko sa Normal... this picture, unprocessed, was taken at 1/30th of a second. Do you think pictures like these are salvageable?

http://www.f3mphotography.com/images/DigiPhoto/RonaEddieson/DSC_9444.JPG

Thanks,

Marco

Naka-set ang VR ko sa Normal... this picture, unprocessed, was taken at 1/30th of a second. Do you think pictures like these are salvageable?

http://www.f3mphotography.com/images/DigiPhoto/RonaEddieson/DSC_9444.JPG

Thanks,

Marco

mmmmmmm... 1/30th of a second... You've cut your shutter speed too slow for this kinda shot Marco... I'm afraid you have to understand that VR won't save any image from having any blur in them, even if you use active mode at this speed specially if there's subject movement involved... What I see is you were shooting in ambient light, if I'm not mistaken... correct me if I'm wrong here, coz I don't know any other reason for shooting at this slow shutter; or are you at slow sync with your flash? :Thinking:

Regarding the salvageability (tama ba spelling?) of the image... Suggestion: I'd turn this to B/W...

was a victim of that too, especially indoor shots..what was your ISO setting?

oh well, the subject is moving, IS cannot help in this situation...to be safe with the shoot i use higher ISO.

Hi again Marco... Probably if I'd re-touch the image to make it usable... I'd present it something like this.

:) Now, regarding the noise and tone... Just apply that on your own taste...

http://www.earlgonzalez.com/DSC_9444.jpg

Sir Marco, I think the VR cant compensate for the movement of the subject really. (Though I could be mistaken) However what Earl has done to the photo is really good. I learned just recently that some of the blurry/technically incorrect shots can be incorporated into a layout and many images styles may save the picture (B&W, Sepia tone, etc.)

Hi again Marco... Probably if I'd re-touch the image to make it usable... I'd present it something like this.

:) Now, regarding the noise and tone... Just apply that on your own taste...

http://www.earlgonzalez.com/DSC_9444.jpg

Hay... I slept through it and I am feeling better now... woke up late though. Thanks Earl for the input. I didn't know that you could turn that picture around and make it a classic. The thing is, I tried converting the photo to B&W, adding some Sepia filter on it, then some grain, I still couldn't get the effect that you did on it. Would you be kind enough to share what you did to the photo?

Thanks again.

Marco

Sir Marco,
I tried playing with some of my wedding photos and I found it rather easy to get the effect with a photoshop plug-in called Alien-Skin Exposure :)

hey marco,

im sori to hear that... IMO the VR mode really wont help you that much, it might help you alittle bit on your camera shake but just very little..... but when try to shoot at 1/30th you are really prone to subject movement unless you use alittle bit of a fill in flash to kinda freeze up the movement but there will still be ghosting....

normally i dont go below 1/60th..... and even then i try to shoot in continious mode like 3 to 4 frames in a row to make sure dat i get 2-3 shots that are sharp....just for back up...

@earl,
you really did a good job on making it a classic shot.....man i wouldn't probably have the patience to clone or erase the ghosting to make it look like a sharp image....well done sir earl!!!! i guess it pays off to be patient...hhehehehhe

normally i dont go below 1/60th..... and even then i try to shoot in continious mode like 3 to 4 frames in a row to make sure dat i get 2-3 shots that are sharp....just for back up...


I use that trick too.. the first one comes out blurry, but somewhere between the 2&4 shot in high speed comes out better than the first in the series.

I won't say I told you so because I also learned that lesson thru experience so I always shoot in 1/focal length when it matters at the expense of higher iso noise.

The most important thing is you learned something new in that wedding. We all know you made a mistake and you know you won't do it again. That saves you from a big problem when you become the main photog.

Go over again to your shots but this time forget about sharpness. Look for images where blur and moments compliments each other. I'm sure there are.

Examine those shots and see if you can duplicate that. Sometimes, it adds a little interest seeing some blurred shots in one whole album. :)

marco during the wedding did you chimp and zoom in to view your shots? you have to zoom in to really look at your shots. pressing play once will not give you a good detail of your picture. :)

Hay... I slept through it and I am feeling better now... woke up late though. Thanks Earl for the input. I didn't know that you could turn that picture around and make it a classic. The thing is, I tried converting the photo to B&W, adding some Sepia filter on it, then some grain, I still couldn't get the effect that you did on it. Would you be kind enough to share what you did to the photo?

Thanks again.

Marco
Hey Marco, everything was done by hand in photoshop that involved alot of layers... Probably as Sonny said, you may be able to get a similar effect by using a plug-in but I'd rather patch things manually. From what I remember... Just follow through this and experiment on the principle coz I don't recall in verbatim the exact order...:Grin: I converted the image to B/W and tried to maintain detail in the shade separation... Then I tried to fix selected areas which had excess blur and unwanted ghosting--I intentionally left some to suggest the candidness of the moment... Then I applied some toning to the image just to make it look abit vintage and worn... Actually I prefer it to be a bit darker but this is my own preference and might not be too suited as an example... Anyway, I intentionally darkened areas to mislead the eye of the viewer abit but not too much that it distracts... I then applied abit of sharpening to the image as well as noise... Oh, and before I forget, no default filter or setting was used in this image. You have to really experiment to get your desired ambiance...

Hope this helps... :)

Wow Earl! That's a lot that you did in that photo. Just reading your reply makes my head spin :Dum: . I think the most number of layers I've done in Photoshop is 10 :( . I really appreciate you taking time to work on that photo. I got inspiration from it and now I know that at least, some of my photos can still be salvaged. Maybe I need to take some Photoshop courses to learn these kind of techniques. The only thing I ever do in Photoshop is adjust the levels, curves, saturation, and dodging and burning using an overlay layer.

Thanks a lot! Highly appreciated!

Marco

Marco,

Your inbox is full. Need to pm you :D

Sonny

Marco,

Your inbox is full. Need to pm you :D

Sonny

I deleted some messages now Sonny. You can PM me again. Thanks.

Marco

I never liked the VR in the 70-200. Like you I got terribly blurred shots during an event. Good thing my sharp shots outnumbered the blurry shots.

Like Dino said, learn from this and be better next time. To be sure, take shots first with flash, then with ambient light, or vice versa. It's tricky and needs practice, but it will help ensure you get good shots from a wedding.

And don't rely too much on the LCD - because of the size, a blurry shot will appear sharp. So take as many shots as you can to be sure.

Cheers!

I have the 70-200 IS of Canon and it is a habit of mine to always check on the IS to make sure that it is on. Sometimes it gets turned off when it is in the bag. Any fast movement will blur if it is less than 125th of a second. If the people are stationary, 1/60 is a safe speed. If you are too far from the subject, even flash wont help. There is always a lesson learned from every shoot. Don't be too hard on yourself.:)

Hi again Marco... Probably if I'd re-touch the image to make it usable... I'd present it something like this.

:) Now, regarding the noise and tone... Just apply that on your own taste...

http://www.earlgonzalez.com/DSC_9444.jpg

Hi Earl,

What do you think of this? (Gaya gaya... he he he... :Grin: )

http://www.f3mphotography.com/images/DigiPhoto/RonaEddieson/DSC_9444-01_Copyright2.jpg

Thanks for the insight.

Marco

Sir Marco,

If you're doing a paid shoot, I don't think you should experiment. I won't. It's too risky. Buti na lang sir di ka nga main kundi patay. Baka demanda pa abutin...

If it's not a paid shoot you can breathe now sir. Just take it as a learning experience.

Medyo mahirap talaga makakuha ng perfect shots with a shutter speed of 1/10 or 1/30. Mabagal na talaga yun. Even with a VR. Pero nasa humahawak din. Ako di ko na kaya ng handheld yun tapos sharp.

You can try three things to lessen the probability of getting blurred shots :

1. Ang rule kasi sir if you're shooting in low light situations, be sure that your formula is:

shutter speed => 1/focal length of your lens

For example for a 80mm focal length. Shutter speed should not be slower than 1/80th of a second.

Sometimes if the depth of field is not important for a shoot, I just use shutter speed priority. Then, follow the rule where focal length is the longest focal length of the zoom lens used. Like, in your case, 200mm. In this case, di ka na mag-iisip at sigurado sumusunod ka sa rule at any range of your lens.

2. Another alternative is to shoot at High ISO. If you're using a a D200 or higher, the noise management is pretty good. You can even shoot as high as 1600 if you want. For me, it's better to have noisy shots than blurred ones. Especially for weddings.

We shoot at slow shutter speeds to get the proper exposure. If we set our cam to High ISO, we can set our shutter speeds to faster values. Thus, low probability of blurred photos.

Sir you can also try the Auto ISO feature of your cam. It's pretty useful. With this feature, you can set your desired shutter speed and aperture then yung cam na bahala to adjust the ISO to get the proper exposure. Just be sure your shutter speed is following the rule I mentioned above para sharp ang photos.

3. Use a flash and shoot at the lowest ISO.

And, never trust your LCD. If you want to check, zoom in and check the focus point(example, the eyes) in your photo and see if it is blurred. You can take the shot again if it is. This the great thing about digital photography.

Actually sir, minsan may ganyang araw. Parang bad hair day ba. hehehehe :)

Sana makatulong. Happy shooting!

Just my 2 cents.:Grin:



Naasar ako ! Grabe! Nag-experiment kasi ako kanina sa lighting, sa exposure, sa use of lens, sa kasal na kinover ko kanina. Tininitingnan ko ngayon yung mga shots ko, wala akong makita na papasa sa aking (lalo na sa asawa kong) taste. Buti na lang at di ako ang main fotog. 4 gig of photos, wala akong makita!

I relied on my 70-200VR which I have just used once, and even then sandaling-sandali lang. Dami kong shots taken at 1/10th of a second to 1/30th, puro blurred... grrr!!! Okay naman sya sa lcd ng camera pagdating ko dito sa bahay, blurred! Mas mabuti pa noong ginamit ko lang yung 80-200/2.8 sa last wedding ko, at least conscious ako na I cannot go below a certain speed.

Andami pa akong kinakaasaran... buti na lang mabait yung couple.

Just venting... sorry... :(

Marco

@Melvin, Thats a fantastic tip you shared. Thanks.

@Earl, I must say i got to include that technique in my bag of tricks. Thanks for sharing, you turned that disaster around.

@ Marco, Good work! That's keeping it real! :)

@ Melvin, I know Marco will absorb your careful advice and let it guide him in the future. :)

@ Migs, Thanks Bro.! I just believe that Marco or anyone would do the same for me if I was the one who needed help. :)

Be well guys...

@ Melvin, buti na nga lang at 2nd fotog lang ako dyan :). And it wasn't the couple who was paying me, it was the main fotog. I already got what he wanted me to take so I was freer to experiment at that point. Thanks for the tips, we'll keep that in mind for my coming Saturday wedding :Grin:.

@ Earl, grabe, pumuti yata ang buhok ko sa pag-iisip kung paano mo nagawa yan :D. Pero tinintingnan ko yung gawa mo, mine is still not up to par :(. Pero salamat pa rin kasi you opened my eyes to new techniques.

Thanks all!

Marco

@ Melvin, those are great tips and advice. I actually had an embarrasssing experience with the LCD. I took candids of my cousin and his fiance, and showed them the shots through the LCD. When I got home, I checked on the computer screen and was horrified to see that almost all of them were blurred! Buti nalang hindi ako official photographer. Baka sabihin niya pa L lens pa, palpak naman hahaha. Sabihin ko nalang tinangay ng bagyo yung compact flash. :D

Baka sabihin niya pa L lens pa, palpak naman hahaha.
That's hilarious Amiel... :D

You can almost sing that to the tune of an old song... mmmmmmmm... "Pa L, L Lens ka pa... (ooops censored)" :D

That's hilarious Amiel... :D

You can almost sing that to the tune of an old song... mmmmmmmm... "Pa L, L Lens ka pa... (ooops sensored)" :D


hahahahaa alam ko kasunod nyan hahaha...censored nga :D

Hi guys, Marco,

This one also happened to me before. I remember I experienced a hard time convincing the client that the shot is nice (artistic, hehe!) that time I was using film - and no VR or IS yet.

as a lesson for me, I always put in mind that when shooting (specially indoors), i should have a shutter speed of at least 1/"mm+" - focal length rounded-up to the nearest s/s setting + ISO400-800. Thanks to the help of VR/IR, we can now set 2 stops slower.

And also, one more thing i learned when I was using film...

"It's rather grainy than blurred..."

Thanks. :)

hehe! When things like this happens to me, I only have one painful decision to make: DELETE!

So the next time I'm shooting around, my mind knows where the crappy shots will go to.

hehehe. personally, tricky for me yung 70-200 (canon, my first tele) when i frst got it a couple of months ago. up until then, i was used to zooming in and out with my feet as I was used to using primes (longest at med tele 85mm).

melvin's advice is a really sound one as you always don't have the luxury of time to think about 1/focal length as you go through the mm ranges in a particular shoot. i lost a lot of cool opportunities when i went to banaue using my tele. i got used to shutter speeds of less than 1/100 and relatively fast apertures. and was thinking that way when i was using my tele. big mistake.

i can only reiterate on what melvin said, especially if you're using a long lens for the FIRST time ever... put it in shutter priority, 1/250 at least... and ISO400 (minimum) as default if you don't want to "think" anymore. just make sure you check your histogram for potential blown highlights/overexposure when shooting in well-lit areas. you can get creative with dof and all that later as the most important thing at the moment is to not blur the photo :)

having said that, i hope i don't forget what i just preached on my next trip :)

marco, for what it's worth, at least ok yung composition mo sa sample photo. just get earl to record an action for you ;p

@Melvin, Thats a fantastic tip you shared. Thanks.
This is the great thing about forums like this. We learn from each other's experiences. :)

I have my own horror stories when I was still starting in photography. haha :D

i can only reiterate on what melvin said, especially if you're using a long lens for the FIRST time ever... put it in shutter priority, 1/250 at least... and ISO400 (minimum) as default if you don't want to "think" anymore.

You can also try shooting with a flash in a lowly lit room using ISO 400. You'll see some difference when shooting at ISO 200. The backgrounds are brighter. :)